The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1887-03-03
"DEAD SEA APPLES"

The sociability and friendships formed
| in the saloon the writer designates a
"Dead Sea apple" The men who strike
hands with one another as comrades and
boon companions will stand by while one
of their number goes headlong to de.
struction; will observe with stolid pas
sivity the victims advance from one fatal
symptom to another will register his
successive downward steps, marking in
cold blood his loss Of one holdfast after
another; and when ruin, complete and
irreversible, has concluded the drama,
they will turn away and pursue their
own affairs. The truth is that the spirit
of the saloon is incompatible with the
termination or growth of real friendship,
as it is with any good thing.
THE GROUNDWORK OF SOCIALISM.
But the drugged liquor which destroys
the bodies of poor men poisons also their
minds and prepares them for hostility to
the law by encouraging them to believe
that every idler among them is somehow
entitled to living at the hands Of
society, and that the men whose brains
and industry have put them above want
or secured for them an abundance are
the enemies Of the poor. This is the
groundwork of Socialism, and makes
their. poverty seem uncomfortable.
ADULrERANTs IN LIQUOR.
Thus it is that the poor suffer thou.
sand ways through their poverty, and
one of the abuses practiced most auda-
ciously upon them is the adulteration Of
all the intoxicants sold to them. Alec.
holic drinks made by the most honest
processes are bad enough in their conse.
quences, but the drinks of commerce are
sophisticated to such an extent that those
who use them habitually and freely are
exposed to whole catalogue of diseases
from which our ancestors, with all their
intemperance, were free. The effect Of
many of the adulterants commonly en-
ployed, moreover, is to excite the nervous
system and act toxically upon the
cerebral centres, with the frequent result
of melting to maniacal deeds, which may
very easily be ascribed to native savagery
of disposition.
THE COST OF SOCIETY.
These poisons do not affect all alike.
But society is exposed to injury from all
who drink, and the danger is perennial.
Of this no specific proof is needed. The
cost to society is enormous in the shape
of prisons and police forces, and Courts,
and insane asylums, and warehouses;.
The worst effects are seen in
connection with the poor, but it does not
follow that the rest of the community
escape. Whether man be worth ST.
600, 600 or rs cents, he can get but one
series ofseusations and effects from drink.
He may, if wealthy, get them in a more
ornamental and pleasant way, but that is
the extent of the distinction between
the saloons of the rich and those of the
poor.
Drunkenness brutalizes and degrades
all classes of men and increases the fric-
tion of the progressive effort immensely.
Of that there can be no doubt. But
where it's heaviest and keenest suffering
falls is upon the women of the land.
The miseries Of the mothers, wives and
daughters of drunkards do not need re.
peating. They are apparent on every
hand. .as
WHAT SHALL BE THE REMEDY?
The writer continues g. great length to
point out the evils engeudered by the
institution known as the saloon. AS q
remedy for these evils he advocates up
roofing and abolishiDg the saloons from
one end of this broad land to the other
in short. wholesale prohibition Of the
business of retailing liquors at the bar,
especially where social drinking is in
order. ,an -.
The message Of the President to
Congress vetoing the pension bill that
recently passed both houses of Copgres s